SpaceX agrees to appear before NYC Council after subpoena showdown

After refusing to attend a subpoenaed hearing on Oct. 5, SpaceX has agreed to testify before the New York City Council’s Committee on Technology on Friday at 10 a.m. ET. Council Speaker Julie Menin said the company’s decision followed a threat to ask a state judge to enforce the subpoena and a warning that penalties could be imposed under city law. The council’s AI safety investigation, which also heard from Anthropic, OpenAI, Google and Meta, aims to determine whether new legislation is needed to protect public safety, cybersecurity, the economy and privacy.

Committee chair Carmen De La Rosa highlighted SpaceX’s expanding federal role and the importance of its input on data privacy, safeguards and whistleblower protections. The council also noted ongoing lawsuits tied to SpaceX’s Grok image generator, which has been used to create non-consensual deepfake pornographic images.